This morning, with Egyptian fellahin ranting on the TV news, Sugar managed to ignore all noisy rioting and learned The Sit. Yes, friends, she is the genius of the canine kingdom.
We started with clicker training, but progressed within the hour to the verbal cue (naturally, there was a treat involved; in this case, Cheerios, which she adores even more than pickled tongue, to which Jewish Poodles seem to be partial, though the tongue I bought is from the French recipe, not wanting to take unnecessary chances). The Sit is a big deal. No more jumping up. No more uncivilized beastliness. Sugar sits on command, even with the television blaring. Sugar is becoming a trained dog. My desire for her is to be the best behaved dog in town. A dog one can take anywhere, in my purse even. Only glitch in my dream is that no one will have her anymore: where can you take even a tiny dog these days? To a cafe? The supermarket? The deli? The therapist? No. Signs everywhere: No Pets Allowed. Rules everywhere. With all the business about animal rights, it seems to me that dogs have fewer rights than ever, fewer rights of assembly than Egyptians. Maybe someday, when she's a mature dog, when she grows to her full weight of 5 pounds, she can rally house pets in Lafayette Park to bark and mew and cheep their heads off for their legitimate rights.
But Sugar's human, sadly, IS interested in the upheavals in the Middle East. And Sugar's human is not optimistic. Without haranguing you, precious reader, with opinions about El Baradei and the Muslim Brotherhood, I will make just one prediction:
I predict that before Egyptians enjoy Western-style democracy (versus Muslim-style Sharia "democracy," involving stonings, beheadings, amputations and suchlike for infractions of the law), Sugar will be taught to jump through flaming hula hoops. Just one human's prediction, and God I wish it weren't so. But she's so... damned...smart.
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